Inspo

One of the neatest parts about having a blog is interacting with the people who actually take the time to read my stuff. What is even COOLER than that is when they send you pieces of their own work, which I love to read. Here is a poem fromsimilarsouls.wordpress.com. I would love to hear your thoughts on this:

“YOU CAN’T SANITIZE YOU SPIRIT. SOME INSTANT RUB ON RELIGION THAT CLEANS YOU UP, COLD BREW COFFEE AND MINIMALIST BACKPACK THAT YOU CARRY AROUND LIKE YOUR SAVIOR. AUTHENTIC SIMPLICITY COMES NOT FROM YOU STYLE OR INSTAGRAM SKILLS. SANITIZE YOUR SIN WITH CLEAN AND SIMPLE HIPSTER CHRISTIANITY AND COME YOUR COLD BREW COFFEE TURNS LUKE WARM, SPAT OUT. I WANT TO SEE MESSY HAIR AND MIS MATCHED SOCKS IN PEWS WITH REAL PEOPLE. HUNGRY SOULS FOR MORE THAN A TRENDY GOD THAT FITS INSIDE CHECKED BOXES ON BASIC BULLETINS. I WANT TO MEET THE INSECURE, UNSURE, LATE TO CHURCH TAP WATER DRINKERS THAT THIRST FOR LIVING WATER IN THEIR WORLD. I WANT TO MEET JESUS ON SUNDAY MONDAY TUESDAY ALL THE WAY THROUGH WITH HUMBLE HANDS LIFTED IN WONDER WITH YOU. I WANT TO TAKE CHURCH TO STREETS WITHOUT BRAND NAME JESUS. BEAT OUT OF MY CHEST I WANT A SANCTIFIED SOUL OVERFLOWING MESSY AND FULL.”

“We must use time creatively, and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy, and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood.” –Martin Luther King, Jr., from his Letter from Birmingham Jail, April 16, 1963

WOW GUYS!! // God is soooo good, so crazy, so beautiful, and so amazing. He has blessed Georgia Southern University with the amazing opportunity to host author, speaker, and blogger JORDAN LEE (Soul Scripts) for a college girl’s event! Music/ coffee/ conversations/ and a night that will change EVERYTHING! Our location is TBA within the next coming week, but we ask that you pray for this event, save the date, and spread the word! WE WANT EVERY COLLEGE GIRL HERE! Mark your calender’s!!! ❤ Start the new year off right. Come and get ready to be renewed from the inside out. God is going to change hearts! NEW YEAR RENEW ME // January 25th 2017 // 7-9 pm // Location TBA at Georgia Southern University

For many people, this is not obviously an act of love. They do not feel loved when they are told that God created them for his glory. They feel used. This is understandable given the way love has been almost completely distorted in our world. For most people, to be loved is to be made much of. Almost everything in our Western culture serves this distortion of love. We are taught in a thousand ways that love means increasing someone’s self-esteem. Love is helping someone feel good about themselves. Love is giving someone a mirror and helping him like what he sees.

This is not what the Bible means by the love of God. Love is doing what is best for someone. But making self the object of our highest affection is not best for us. It is, in fact, a lethal distraction. We were made to see and savor God- and savoring him, to be supremely satisfied, and thus spread in all the world the worth of his presence. Not to show people the all-satisfying God is not to love them. To make them feel good about themselves when they were made to feel good about seeing God is like taking someone to the Alps and locking them in a room full of mirrors.

This is totally appropriate since this is the inspirational part of my blog. Well, you should be inspired by my good friend Katie Bulmer. She just came out with her very first E-Book (that will be in print soon)! She has a heart for college girls and wants them to seek more in this life. Her new book, Sorority Girls Can Change The World, was published out of a complete act of courage and bravery. It is easy to read and life changing, especially on Greek Row. A GREAT and WONDERFUL Christmas read!!

This is from Katie to all of her readers// “Guys, it’s official. “Sorority Girls Can Change The World” is ready to read!

This is a book to all the girls looking for their happily ever after realizing dang Cinderella’s castle was so much farther away than they thought it would be. To the girl that is longing for significance but keep coming up empty. I hear you, and I wrote this for you.

If you are reading this book, I have prayed for you before you read this. My prayer is something in these pages will help you to realize your incredible power of influence and the world changing potential within you! If you know a sorority girl that could benefit from these words I hope you share it with her too.”

There are countless ways to celebrate the holidays. My favorite thing about this time of year? Traditions — a special piece of life which grow as you grow. They may begin with your mother and father, then morph and trade with your significant other and later, pass down to your children. The great thing about traditions is you can — and should — also create them with and for yourself. Whatever the case may be, traditions are ever-changing yet always filled with love and memories.

To help you get started on creating new traditions, I listed out some of my favorites below!

My fiancé and I create an ornament each year that represents our collective past year — we have one for every year since we met. It may be cheesy, but I love looking at what mattered most to us as our relationship grew…our tradition, which makes it special.

This is from Jordan Lee’s devo called “It’s Complicated: Dating, Dudes, & Drama.”

Here is some encouragement to my girl’s who have a fear of being hurt, losing freedom, being vulnerable, and/ or choosing the wrong person when it comes to dating.

FEAR IS FAITH IN THE WRONG THING.

& FEAR, EVEN OF HEARTBREAK, ISN’T SO BAD WHEN WE PLACE OUR FAITH IN GOD OVER A GUY.

Can I get an amen?!

Anyways, Happy Thursday.

Love,

Me!

MY GPA WON’T MATTER IN HEAVEN.

Scars To Your Beautiful- Alessia Cara

“She just wants to be beautiful
She goes unnoticed, she knows no limits
She craves attention, she praises an image
She prays to be sculpted by the sculptor
Oh, she don’t see the light that’s shining
Deeper than the eyes can find it
Maybe we have made her blind
So she tries to cover up her pain and cut her woes away
‘Cause cover girls don’t cry after their face is made

But there’s a hope that’s waiting for you in the dark
You should know you’re beautiful just the way you are
And you don’t have to change a thing, the world could change its heart
No scars to your beautiful, we’re stars and we’re beautiful
Oh-oh, oh-oh
And you don’t have to change a thing, yhe world could change its heart
No scars to your beautiful, we’re stars and we’re beautiful

She has dreams to be an envy, so she’s starving
You know, covergirls eat nothing
She says beauty is pain and there’s beauty in everything
What’s a little bit of hunger?
I could go a little while longer, she fades away
She don’t see her perfect, she don’t understand she’s worth it
Or that beauty goes deeper than the surface
Oh, oh
So to all the girls that’s hurting
Let me be your mirror, help you see a little bit clearer
The light that shines within

There’s a hope that’s waiting for you in the dark
You should know you’re beautiful just the way you are
And you don’t have to change a thing, the world could change its heart
No scars to your beautiful, we’re stars and we’re beautiful

Oh-oh, oh-oh
And you don’t have to change a thing, the world could change its heart
No scars to your beautiful, we’re stars and we’re beautiful

No better you than the you that you are (no better you than the you that you are)
No better life than the life we’re living (no better life than the life we’re living)
No better time for your shine, you’re a star (no better time for your shine, you’re a star)
Oh, you’re beautiful, oh, you’re beautiful

And there’s a hope that’s waiting for you in the dark
You should know you’re beautiful just the way you are
And you don’t have to change a thing, the world could change its heart
No scars to your beautiful, we’re stars and we’re beautiful
Oh-oh, oh-oh
And you don’t have to change a thing, the world could change its heart
No scars to your beautiful, we’re stars and we’re beautiful”

so idk if you’ve ever felt paralyzed to your bed in the morning after thinking about everything you have to do (especially during finals week) but that has been me this week. I just wanna REMIND y’all that He will equip us if we ask fervently. and if my sentences don’t make sense/weird it’s because I am so sleep deprived 🙂

I have been given the amazing opportunity to spend a week in New Orleans helping out at an animal rescue center. A group of us are educating outselves more on what animal rights are before going. Here is a TedTalk that was shared with me. It is very insightful.

“Rubaiya Ahmad is a former volunteer at a cat rescue programme and zoo in the US, and driven by the culling of her own dog in Dhaka, Rubaiya founded Obhoyaronno — Bangladesh’s Animal Welfare Foundation in 2009. Obhoyaronno is the country’s first and currently only animal welfare organization working to end animal cruelty through advocacy, education, and humane programme implementation. Due to Obhoyaronno’s persistent advocacy, the government ended dog culling in Dhaka in January 2012 and declared Dhaka as the country’s first ‘no-cull’ city.”

When you surround yourself with people who love you, you can make anywhere your home.

Lost In My Mind

The Head and The Heart

“Put your dreams away for now
I won’t see you for some time
I am lost in my mind
I get lost in my mind
Momma once told me
You’re already home where you feel loved
I am lost in my mind
I get lost in my mind
Oh my brother
Your wisdom is older than me
Oh my brother
Don’t you worry ’bout me
Don’t you worry
Don’t you worry, don’t worry about me
How’s that bricklayin’ comin’?
How’s your engine runnin’?
Is that bridge gettin’ built?
Are your hands gettin’ filled?
Won’t you tell me, my brother?
‘Cause there are stars
Up above
We can start
Moving forward
How’s that bricklayin’ comin’?
How’s your engine runnin’?
Is that bridge gettin’ built?
Are your hands gettin’ filled?
Won’t you tell me, my brother?
‘Cause there are stars
Up above
We can start
Moving forward
Lost in my mind
Lost in my mind
Oh I get lost in my mind
Lost, I get lost
I get lost in my mind
Lost in my mind
Yes I get lost in my mind,
Lost, I get lost
I get lost
Oh I get lost
Oh I get…”

Here is one of my favorite lines from a poem my sweet friend wrote. We would never guess that some of our friends struggle with certain things. However, when they are transparent, it is comforting to know that we are not alone. During a season that can be very anxiety-provoking for some, I find peace in the fact that He is constantly fighting for us and constantly reminding us to release our anxiety to Him. THAT is how we become free.

“He gently whispers ‘If only you could see’

I loved you before you were thought of

I created you to know Me

Release your anxiety to Me, my child

For it is then, you will be free”

-Abbie Deal

Creds: Abbie Deal

Happiness Lives Next Door

“Someone sends her flowers each evening,
And her young heart is flooded with joy.
So don’t keep her waiting, deliver the flowers,
To happiness, who lives next door.”

-Willie Nelson

Emma Wason on her mom during a Q&A- International Women’s Day

“She was a single working mother and is also a Type 1 diabetic. So seeing her strength and resilience growing up was really inspiring. I think she instilled in me—particularly in my teenage years when I was feeling insecure and confused about what my purpose was—she really instilled in me that what I was thinking and what I was doing and what I was saying were ultimately infinitely more important than my physical appearance.”

Human Family

By Maya Angelou

I note the obvious differences
in the human family.
Some of us are serious,
some thrive on comedy.

Some declare their lives are lived
as true profundity,
and others claim they really live
the real reality.

The variety of our skin tones
can confuse, bemuse, delight,
brown and pink and beige and purple,
tan and blue and white.

I’ve sailed upon the seven seas
and stopped in every land,
I’ve seen the wonders of the world
not yet one common man.

I know ten thousand women
called Jane and Mary Jane,
but I’ve not seen any two
who really were the same.

Mirror twins are different
although their features jibe,
and lovers think quite different thoughts
while lying side by side.

We love and lose in China,
we weep on England’s moors,
and laugh and moan in Guinea,
and thrive on Spanish shores.

We seek success in Finland,
are born and die in Maine.
In minor ways we differ,
in major we’re the same.

I note the obvious differences
between each sort and type,
but we are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

In my research, I’ve interviewed a lot of people who never fit in, who are what you might call “different”: scientists, artists, thinkers. And if you drop down deep into their work and who they are, there is a tremendous amount of self-acceptance. -Brené Brown